House of Torment Part 34

"By your patience, ladies," he said, "I will make endeavour to improvise for you upon a theme. We have spent this day in seeing beauties such as sure I never thought to see with my mortal eyes. We are in the land of colour, of sweet odours; the balmy smells of nard and ca.s.sia are flung about the cedarn alleys where we walk. We have sucked the liquid air in a veritable garden of the Hesperides, and, indeed, I looked to see the three fair daughters of Hesperus along those crisped shades and bowers.

And we have seen also"--his voice was almost dreaming as he spoke--"the greatest church e'er built to G.o.d's glory by the hand of man. 'Tis indeed a mountain scooped out, a valley turned upsides. The towers of the Abbey Church at Westminster might walk erect in the middle nave; there are pillars with the girth of towers, and which appear so slender that they make one shudder as they rise from out the ground or depend them from the gloomy roof like stalact.i.tes in the cave of a giant."

Madame La Motte nodded, purred, and murmured to herself. The whimsical and studied Court language did not now fall upon her ears for the first time. In the fas.h.i.+on of that age all men of culture and position learnt to talk in this fas.h.i.+on upon occasion, with cla.s.sic allusion and in graceful prose.

But to sweet Elizabeth it was all new and beautiful, and as she gazed at her lover her eyes were liquid with caressing wonder, her lips curved into a bow of pride at such dear eloquence.

Johnnie plucked the strings of the chitarrone once or twice, and then, his eyes half closed, began a simple improvisation in a minor key, the while he lifted his voice and began to sing his ballad of evening colours:

See! limner Phoebus paints the sky Vermilion and gold And doth with purple tapestry The waning day enfold.

--The royal, lucent, Tyrian dye King Philip wore in Thessaly.

The Lord of Morning now doth keep Herald for Lady Night, Whose robes of black and silver sweep Before his tabard bright.

--All silver-soft and sable-deep, As when she brought Endymion sleep!

Now honey-coloured Luna she Hath lit her lamp on high; And paleth in her Majestie The twin Dioscuri.

--Set in gold-powdered samite, she-- Queen of the Night! Queen of the Sea!

His voice faded away into silence; the mellow tenor ceasing in an imperceptible diminuendo of sound.

There was a silence, and then Lizzie's hand stole out and touched her lover's. "Oh, Johnnie," she said, "how gracious! And did those lovely words come into thy head as thou sangst them?"

"In truth they did, fairest lady of evening," he answered, bending low over her hand. "And sure 'twas thy dear presence that sent them to me, the musick of thy voice hath breathed a soul into this lute."

... They had arrived safely in Seville the night before, spending three days upon the journey from Cadiz, but travelling in very pleasant and easy fas.h.i.+on.

Mr. Mew, the mate of the _St. Iago_, had business in the city, and while the vessel was discharging its cargo at Cadiz he went up to Seville and took the four travellers with him on board an _alijador_--a long barge with quarters for pa.s.sengers, and a hold for cargo, which was propelled partly by oars in the narrower reaches of the river, but princ.i.p.ally by a large lug sail.

Don Perez had remained in Cadiz, but the tall and sinister young fellow whom Hull and Johnnie had rescued from the Atlantic came in the barge also. The fugitives from England had little to say to him, knowing what he was. Alonso--which was the man's name--had been profuse in his grat.i.tude. His profuseness, however, had been mingled with a continuous astonishment, a brutish wonder which was quite inexplicable to Elizabeth.

"He seemeth," she said once to her esquire, "to think as if such a deed of daring as thou didst in thy kindness for a fellow-creature in peril hath never been known in the world before!"

Madame La Motte and Commendone, however, had said nothing. They knew very well why this poor wretch, who gained his food by such a hideous calling, was amazed at his rescue. They said nothing to the girl, however, dreading that she should ever have an inkling of what the man was.

On the voyage to Seville, a happy, lazy time under the bright sun, Johnnie could not quite understand an obvious friends.h.i.+p and liking which seemed to have sprung up between Alonso and Mr. Mew, who spoke Spanish very adequately.

"I cannot understand," he said upon one occasion to the st.u.r.dy man from the Isle of Wight, "I cannot understand, sir, how you that are an English mariner can talk and consort with this tool of h.e.l.l."

Mr. Mew looked at him with a dry smile. "And yet, master," he said in the true Hamps.h.i.+re idiom and drawl, "bless your heart, you jumped overboard for this same man!"

"The case is different," Johnnie said; "'twas a fellow-creature, and I did as behoved me. But that is no reason to be friendly with such a wretch."

"Look you, Master Commendone," said Mr. Mew, "every man to his trade. I would burn both hands, myself, before I'd live by sworn torturing. But, then, 'tis not my trade. This man's father and his brother have been doing of it almost since birth, and they do it--and sure, a good Catholic like yourself," here he smiled dryly, "cannot but remember that 'tis done under the s.h.i.+eld and order of Holy Church! The d.a.m.ned old Pope hath ordered it."

Johnnie crossed himself. "The sovereign Pontiff," he said, "hath established the Holy Office for punishment of heretics. But the punishment is light and without harshness in the states of His Holiness. In Spain 'tis a matter very different. It was under the Holy Father Innocent IV that this tribunal was created, and the Holy Office in Spain differed in no wise from the comparatively innocuous----"

"What is that, master? That word?"

"It meaneth 'harmless,' Master Mew. What was I saying? Oh, that it differed nothing at all in Spain from the harmless Council which was to detect heresy and reprove it. But during the reign of our good King Edward IV the Holy Office was changed in Spain. The Ebrews were plotting, or said to be plotting, against the realm, and they had come to much wealth and power. Pope Sixtus made many protests, but the right of appointing inquisitors and directing the operation of the Holy Office in Spain was reserved to the Spanish Crown. And from this date, Master Mew, Holy Church at any rate hath disclaimed to be responsible for it.

That was then and is now the true feeling of Rome. 'Tis true that in Spain the Church tolerates the Inquisition, but its blood-stained acts are from the Crown and such priests as are ministers of the Crown."

Father Chilches had taught Johnnie his history, truly enough. But it seemed to make very little impression upon the mate.

"Art a gentleman," he said, "and know doubtless more than I, but such peddling with words and splicing of facts are not to my mind. The d.a.m.ned old Pope say I, and always shall, when it's safe to speak! But the pith of our talk, Master Commendone, was that you would not have me give comrades.h.i.+p with this Alonso. I see not your point of view. He is of his time and must do his duty."

The mate snapped a tarry thumb and finger with a tolerant smile. "You've saved him, so that he may go on with his torturin'," he said, "and I like to talk with him because I find him a good fellow, and that is all about it, Master Commendone."

Johnnie had not got much small change from his conference with the mate, but when they arrived at Seville, he saw him and the man called Alonso no more, and his mind was directed upon very other things.

They arrived at the city late at night, and their mails were taken to the great inn of Seville known as the Posada de las Munecas, or house of puppets, so called from the fact that in days gone by, at the great annual Seville fair, a famous performance of marionettes had taken place in front of it.

The Posada was an old Moorish palace, as beautiful under the sunlight as an Oriental song, and when they rose in the morning and Johnnie had despatched a serving-man to find if Don Jose Senebria was in residence, he and his companions wakened to the realisation of a loveliness of which they had never dreamed.

The sky was like a great hollow turquoise; the sun beat down upon the Pearl of Andalusia with limpid glory, and played perpetually upon the white and painted walls. The orange trees, only introduced into Spain some five-and-twenty years before from Asia, were globed with their golden fruit among the dark, jade-like leaves of polished green; feathery palms with their mailed trunks rose up to cut the blue, and on every side buildings which glowed like immense jewels were set to greet the unaccustomed northern eye. The Posada was a blaze of colour, half Moorish, half Gothic, fantastic and alluring as a rare dream.

Johnnie heard early in the morning that Don Jose would be away for two days, having travelled to his vineyards beyond the old Roman village of Sancios. The day therefore, and the morrow also, was left to them for sight-seeing. Both he and Elizabeth had in part forgotten the cloud of distress under which they had left their native land. The child often talked to him of her father, making many half-shy confidences about her happy life at Hadley, telling him constantly of that brave and stalwart gentleman. But she now accepted all that had happened with the perfect innocence and trustfulness of youth. Upon her white and stainless mind what she had undergone had left but little trace. Even now she only half realised her ravishment to the house with the red door, and that Madame La Motte was not a pattern of kindness, discretion, and fine feeling would never have entered Lizzie's simple mind. She was going to be married to Johnnie!--it was to be arranged almost at once--and then she knew that there need be no more trouble, no weariness, no further searchings of heart. She and Johnnie would be together for ever and ever, and that was all that mattered!

Indeed, under these bright skies, among the gay, good-humoured, and heedless people of Seville, it would have been very difficult for much older and more world-weary people than this young man and maid to be sad or apprehensive.

It had all been a feast, a never-ending feast for eye and ear. They had stood before pictures which were world-famous--they had seen that marvellous allegory in pigment, where "a hand holds a pair of scales, in which the sins of the world--set forth by bats, peac.o.c.ks, serpents, and other emblems--are weighed against the emblems of the Pa.s.sion of Christ our Lord; and eke in the same frame, which is thought to be the finer composition, Death, with a coffin under one arm, is about to extinguish a taper, which lighteth a table besprent with crowns, jewels, and all the gewgaws of this earthly pomp. 'In Ictu Oculi' are the words which circle the taper's gleaming light, while set upon the ground resteth a coffin open, the corpse within being dimly revealed."

They had walked through the long colonnade in the palace of the Alcazar, to the baths of Maria de Padilla, the lovely mistress of Pedro the Cruel, "at the Court of whom it was esteemed a mark of gallantry and loyalty to drink the waters of the bath after that Maria had performed her ablutions. Upon a day observing that one of his knights refrained from this act of homage, the King questioned him, and elicited the reply, 'I dare not drink of the water, Sire, lest, having tasted the sauce, I should covet the partridge.'"

All these things they had done together in their love and youth, forgetting all else but the incomparable beauties of art and nature which surrounded them, the music and splendour of Love within their hearts.

... A serving-man came through the patio.

"_Puedo cenar?_" Johnnie asked. "_A que hora es el cenar?_"

The man told him that supper was ready then, and together with the ladies Johnnie left the courtyard and entered the long _comedor_, or dining-hall, a narrow room with good tapestries upon the walls, and a ceiling decorated with heads of warriors and ladies in carved and painted stucco.

It was lit by candle, and supper was spread for the three in the middle of one great table, an oasis of fruit, lights, and flowers.

"_Este es un vino bueno_," said the waiter who stood there.

"It is all good wine in Spain," Johnnie answered, with a smile, as the man poured out _borgona_, and another brought them a dish of grilled salmon.

They lifted their gla.s.ses to each other, and fell to with a good appet.i.te. Suddenly Johnnie stopped eating. "Where is John Hull?" he said. "G.o.d forgive me, I have not thought of him for hours."

"He will be safe enough," Madame La Motte answered, her mouth full of _salmon asado_. "_Mon Dieu!_ but this fish is good! Fear not, Monsieur, thy serving-man can very well take care of himself."

"I suppose so," Johnnie replied, though with a little uneasiness.

"But, Johnnie," Elizabeth said, "Hull told me that he was to be with Master Mew, the mate of our late s.h.i.+p, to see the town with him, so all will be well."

Johnnie lifted his goblet of wine; he had never felt more free, careless, and happy in his life.

"Here," he said, "is to this sweet and hospitable land of Spain, whither we have come through long toils and dangers. 'Tis our Latium, for as the grandest of all poets, Vergil yclept, hath it, '_Per varios casus, per tot discrimina rerum, tendimus in Latium, sedes ubi fata quietas ostendunt_.'"

"And what may that mean, Monsieur?" asked Madame La Motte, pulling the _botella_ towards her. "My Credo, my Paternoster, and my Ave are all my Latin."